1st grade how many objects does it take to sink a boat? class ...

1 ST GRADEHOW MANY OBJECTS DOES IT TAKE TO SINK A BOAT?CLASS SCIENCE FAIR PROJECTSummary: Students will work together as a class to generate a science fairproject. The students will use the steps of the scientific method to ask aquestion, make a hypothesis, design a test, collect data, and draw conclusions.Their findings will be presented to the class and placed on a science fair projectboard for the school science fair. The topic of this project is to find out howmany objects can be placed onto a bowl boat before it sinks.Utah State Core Curriculum Tie:Standard 1: The process of science, communication of science, and thenature of scienceObjective 1: Generating EvidenceObjective 2: Communicating ScienceObjective 3: Knowing in SciencePreparation time: 30 minLesson time: 50 minSmall group size: works best with one adult for every 5 studentsMaterials:1. one tub per table to float the boat in2. one Styrofoam bowl per table, cut the bowl all the way around, about ¾ ofan inch above the bottom to make a boat3. objects to place on the boat to sink it; for example, pennies or washers4. several half sheets of paper per group5. one science fair presentation board6. headings made for the presentation board: why we did this, what we thinkwill happen, how we did it, what we saw, what we learnedObjectives:1. Students will conduct an investigation that follows the scientific method.2. Students will submit a class project to the school science fair.3. Students will perform an experiment and see if the results are reproducible.4. Students will observe how many objects can be added to a boat before itsinks.Background information:A Styrofoam bowl will float on water. When objects are added to thebowl, it eventually sinks when the buoyancy of the boat is overcome by theweight that is added to it. Students will explore whether or not the samenumber of objects will sink the boat if the experiment is tried three times

Pre-lab discussion: Show the Styrofoam boat to the students and ask if theythink it will float. Discuss how many pennies they think it will take to sink theboat. Discuss the important of repeating an experiment. Ask the students ifthey think they will get the same number of pennies to sink the boat each timethey repeat the experiment. Discuss with students what a science fair is and tellthem that they will complete a science fair project today in the classroom.Instructional procedure:I. Experiment - Complete the experiment first and then work on the projectboard.1. Look at the objects at your table that you will use to sink the boat. Make aprediction about how many objects it will take to sink the boat.2. Put the Styrofoam boat onto the water. Take turns adding objects to theboat until it sinks. Be careful to add the objects to the center of the bowl andkeep it balanced. Try this three times to see if you get the same answer eachtime.3. Make a data table for the data, be sure and list your prediction as well as theactual values. Make a bar graph with the three trials on the x-axis and thenumber of objects needed to sink the boat on the y-axis.II. Science fair display board: Assign each group a different section of theclass science fair display board. Each group can decide what to write and thenhelp the students take turns writing the different words on a half sheet of paper.Students will write up their section and then place it in the appropriate area onthe display board. If you take pictures of the students working on the projectyou can put them on the board as well.

1. Why we did the project -- In a couple of sentences, write the purpose of theexperiment. For example, we want to find out how many objects it takes to sinka boat. We also want to find out if we do an experiment three times, will we getthe same answer each time.2. What we think will happen – Make this prediction for each group dependingon what objects are being used to sink the boat. An example, we think that it willtake 20 pennies to sink the boat. If they predict a different outcome then usetheir hypothesis.3. How we did our project -- Simplify the experiment. Put it in number formatof no more than 3 steps.4. Title –Make a title that is catchy and describes the experiment.5. What we saw – Place each group’s data table and graph on the project board.Students can also draw some pictures at the same time to add to the board.6. What we learned -- In a few sentences, explain whether our prediction wascorrect. Explain what this tells us about how many objects it takes to sink a boatand about whether we get the same answer each time we do an experiment.Display board sections:left panel center panel right panelwhy we did the project title what we learnedwhat we think will happentables, pictures,how we did our project drawings name of teacher